“Aye, don’t we all,” Lain says, coming seemingly out of nowhere, and the live music also has suspiciously stopped.
“Oh hell, what did you do?” Greer says and Lain blinks his innocent looking blue eyes.
“Me?” Lain points at himself. “Oh, nothing. I was just chatting with some friends and thought my Omega needed a kiss. I might just need to dip out early before Rory realizes who set his car alarm off.”
“Actually, Lain, do you think you could help me with something?”
He wiggles his eyebrows and I lightly smack his chest. “No. I want to set something up for me and Callum to bond tonight.”
At that, his whole face lights up. This whole time all Lain has wanted was for us to be a whole pack, and I can see he’s more than eager for this all to be official.
“What do you need me to do?”
I tug him by the shirt and whisper my plan in his ear.
I’m about to create a drag path on the carpet of this room if Lain doesn’t bring Callum soon. It’s the room I stayed in during my time at the Heather Beag. I thought using his childhood room would be a little too weird, plus it only has a single bed.
Lain helped me gather as many scentless candles as possible, and they all flicker lightly in the room as I wait. It’s nothing fancy, but it is meaningful.
He told me that the moment I was ready, he would bond me whenever or wherever. Bonding at the Heather Beag seems symbolic in a way and I wanted to surprise him.
“Why won’t you tell me what’s wrong with her? Is she upset?” Callum asks Lain from down the hall.
“I don’t know, mate. She just said she needed to talk to you.”
“Did she seem like talking to me was a good or a bad thing?”
I have to hold my hand over my mouth to not laugh at him. How would he think in a million years that I would be breaking up with him or have bad news to share? This is exactly why we need to bond.
“Just go ask her for yourself,” Lain tells him, all but shoving him through the door.
He still has his black chef apron on, a dark T-shirt underneath, along with his simple, black chef pants. He looks stunned at the threshold as he looks around.
“What’s this?”
“You said to tell you when I was ready.”
“Fuck off,” he says to Lain, who mock clutches at his chest in pain.
“I’ll see you two back at home at our pack house. A real pack house. Can you believe it?” Lain muses, all the while Callum is half shoving him out of the room.
When it’s just him and I in the room, he approaches, his large palms running down my arms.
“You’re sure?”
“I am,” I say, grabbing at his waist. He’s the broadest one of my Alphas and I love our size difference. “I know we both wish we started off on a different foot that we’ve come a long way in such a short time. But you’re my scent match, and?—”
He brings his mouth down to mine, interrupting my monologue.
“I’ve dreamed of this day and for it to be you, I’m a lucky fucking bastard. I still don’t think I deserve you, Maisie, and I’ll prove it every day for the rest of my life. To know you is to love you and I’m?—”
This time, I interrupt him with a kiss.
“I love you too, Callum,” I tell him as we separate from our kiss.
With those words, he’s picking me up effortlessly and tossing me on the bed, a reassuring hand on my throat as he looks down at me like I’m precious.
“Thank you for being patient with me. I know…I know I’m not easy to love,” he says, and that breaks my fucking heart.
